Old Habits and Hard Dying
by rollwithbutter
Summary: Sawyer Rydell has made a rough start in Alexandria. Falling back into old habits has her making more enemies than friends, and having made one enemy in particular, safety within the 'safezone' is no longer a guarantee. Deciding whether to stay or go gets even more complicated once a group of survivors including a certain taciturn, bow-wielding redneck appear...
1. Chapter 1

**AN: So it's been a while since I've written any fanfic. This is my first Walking Dead story (which of course I own no part of. Insert disclaimer here.) and I have it pretty much plotted out, although things may change slightly once the show starts back up. Anyhoo, here we go, taking place in season six, Alexandria.**

* * *

You know I'm a bastard and we only just met.

Guess I probably shouldn't wear this big old sign round my neck.

I'm not dead but I misplaced the will

Gonna wear this smile like its a hundred dollar bill.

-Modest Mouse, Wicked Campaign

* * *

The gates were all wrong. Practically unmanned. Too easy, too vulnerable.

Surveying the walls of Alexandria with his bow at the ready, Daryl Dixon questioned the wisdom of the step they were about to take.

Beside Daryl, Sasha tensed her finger on the trigger of her rifle. Down the line, others stirred restlessly, each adopting similar attitudes of readiness and distrust. Rick held his Colt Python in one hand while supporting baby Judith with the other; Michonne tipped her katana down in an unthreatening pose, but didn't sheath the blade. Tension radiated in such thick waves that it seemed to shimmer with the heat above the sun-baked asphalt. Only Carol held her gun loosely at her side, with a posture that seemed to say she couldn't understand how she had come to be holding such a thing to begin with. Daryl thought this last curious, but trusted Carol had good reason for the pretense.

He returned his attention to the walls. Once glance told him everything he needed to know about the people inside.

They were luckiest damn people alive.

The second thing that Daryl realized - and this was either very concerning or very convenient, depending on how things might pan out - these Alexandrians were the biggest fools alive, as well.

The walls were strong; thick sheets of galvanized tin, twenty feet high or higher, reinforced with steel supports and girders. Adequate for walkers, sure, but walkers weren't the real threat anymore. Didn't these people understand that? Were those gates strong enough to withstand a big-rig or a humvee barreling down that conveniently straight shot of road leading right up to the front gates? Would they stand against a single well-aimed RPG? Daryl didn't think so. He could have sacked the place himself armed with one hand grenade and a single assault rifle, had he been so minded. Good thing for these people he wasn't.

All around were potential hazards. The small neighborhood Aaron had led them through crowded right up against the walls of the commune. Most of the houses were burned out shells, open to the elements and uninhabitable, but a few were structurally sound, including a tall white bell-tower perfectly positioned for a sniper.

But the tower stood unused and empty, and the houses, too close to the walls for Daryl's peace of mind, were the perfect cover for any enemies planning an assault.

 _Fools_ , thought Daryl again. They should have razed the unused buildings to the ground, cut the trees back for a clear line of sight, positioned a sentry in the tower. He narrowed his eyes and spat from the side of his mouth, as if the place left a bad taste.

Over Judith's downy head Rick caught his eye. Daryl read the same measure of disbelief and mistrust. Daryl glanced at Judith, balanced jovially on her father's hip.

They needed this. Maybe it was all just a pipe dream, but they needed to take that chance. When a dying man stumbles out of a desert and into an oasis he doesn't turn his nose up and walk away just because locals are a bit dim. Daryl met Rick's eyes with the barest of nods; they had to do this.

The screech of the gate opening snapped Daryl's attention front and center. He quelled the instinct to raise his bow as the gate rolled aside revealing a deserted street lined by spiritless, bland brick and vinyl houses.

Not a soul moved, inside or out.

The gate stopped and a nervous looking man with curling sandy hair emerged. His eyes widened as he took in the rag-tag newcomers and the amount of firepower they held. He shifted anxiously on his feet and fingered his rifle in a twitchy manner, which made Daryl more uncomfortable than if he had raised the weapon with open hostility. Focused hostility was predictable; fear was not. Fear led to stupidity, and stupidity got people killed. And here was the kind of man who got people killed.

Daryl stayed very still. The rabbity man continued to like he might shoot any one of them for the slightest movement.

Aaron stepped forward, between the group and the twitching rifle. "This is Nicholas," he said. "One of our guards and supply runners."

 _Some guard,_ thought Daryl, arms tensing around his bow. Nicholas's rabbity demeanor still left him unsettled.

Both sides studied the other without a word. Then Aaron moved toward the gates. Suddenly a loud crash followed by a scurrying movement in the grass outside the wall shattered the tension. A chorus of rifles were cocked and raised. Daryl spun on heel, then deftly released a bolt from his bow in one fluid movement. When the thrashing in the grass stopped he collected his prize from beside a toppled metal garbage can. He raised his hand holding a possum by its tail. The crossbow bolt had struck cleanly through its ribs.

"Brought dinner," said Daryl casually, holding the possum out to Nicholas for inspection.

The rabbity man swallowed thickly but made no move to accept Daryl's offering.

Daryl narrowed his eyes. _Nice place. Houses all tricked out, but that don't mean they got manners._

An all too familiar growling moan came from behind. Shuffling down the sidewalk, eyes burning with hungry intent, was a dead man wearing a gore streaked tee-shirt. Daryl made out the words, "I got wood" written on its front. He thought it a shame to have died wearing a shirt like that.

Nicholas half-heartedly raised his rifle, then seemed to freeze up in indecision. His eyes darted back to Daryl and the possum, as if weighing which threat was of greater concern.

Rick waited, giving Nicholas a chance to fire on the walker. When the man remained frozen, Rick drawled in a bored tone, "Sasha."

Sasha stepped forward, her beautiful dark eyes focused and cold. Easy as breathing, she put a single bullet through the dead man's skull. The walker fell to the sidewalk with a meaty thud.

Nicholas deflated visibly and looked relieved that someone else had taken care of the problem. Meekly, he stepped aside, allowing Daryl and the others file through the gate. Judith cooed happily at the sound of a dog barking, still riding on her daddy's hip.

"Good thing we're here," commented Rick drily as he passed.

An understatement if Daryl had ever heard one.

* * *

Sawyer Rydell struggled within a tangle of discordant images that were more dark memory than dream. Birds trilled among the boughs of sun-dappled trees. Near the duck pond, children laughed. Farther in the distance a dog warned a squirrel off with a bark.

But this was not the dream. This was Alexandria, Virginia, walled refuge from the walking dead. Here, tucked safe inside a fortress of tin and steel, Sawyer fitfully slept as the August sun browned her bare skin.

Submerged within a very real dream - a dream which seemed more tangible than the reclining lounge on which she dozed under the spell of singing headphones and the sweet, cathartic breath of a hot Virginia summer - a woman with a face much like Sawyer's own tumbled through the darkness and into a great roiling river.

 _Jamie_.

In the dream, Sawyer dove after her mirror likeness into the watery abyss.

At first she could make out nothing in the frigid black waters. Then Jamie's lovely smile flared to slow life, cutting a sweeping beam bright enough to illuminate the murky spume with an eerie, warm light. Sawyer's breath caught at the sight of Jamie's beloved features. She stretched out her hand, but the current was sweeping them apart. Sawyer kicked angrily, surging forward. Jamie only smiled placidly and waited. _We'll make it together,_ her smile said. _No worries._

Something sharp and bony caught the hem of Sawyer's shirt. She spun, kicking up a whirlwind of bubbles, but the bony limb belonged to a submerged branch and not the monster she had been expecting. She shook herself free and turned back.

Now Jamie was farther downstream, barely visible in the gloom. Her smile had vanished and she called out, the first glint of panic in her amber-brown eyes. A precious lungful of air and muted words poured from the round _O_ of her mouth before spiraling up beyond the outer reaches of the light. All around them the river roared with a malignant thrum of heavy water. Frozen and exhausted, Sawyer pummeled against the current, nearly killing herself with exertion. Jamie's hand extended again from the darkness. Sawyer lunged, but was growing weak. The cold bit into her muscles, freezing and burning. She tried again, stretching through needles of cold, but Jamie drifted away, away, until - finally - she was gone.

Thirty two years of vibrant life, extinguished in a blink. Now just another void where once a brilliant light had been.

A sharp keening tore through the watery grave. Sawyer gasped as cold water froze her throat and she realized it was she who was screaming with terror and rage. The river answered her heartbreak with a silvery nebula of bubbles from her own mouth, cold and devoid of life as stars in a liquid night.

Jamie was dead. Only Sawyer was left, bereft and alone.

Sawyer lurched out of the darkness and into the noonday heat, heart skimming like a skipping stone.

There was no hungry maw of darkness. No monsters driving them under. There was only sun and birds and dogs laughing and crystal blue skies. Only one thing carried over from the dream: The empty hole that had formed now that there was no Jamie.

"Shit," Sawyer murmured, straightening the red triangles of her bikini top with shaking hands. She wondered if she had screamed aloud; she knew she often did.

Her headphones had fallen into the grass. The smoky tones of Eric Burden still howled from the ear buds. Sawyer fished the iPod from under her chair and switched off the player. Her dream had definitely killed the moment.

Next to the 'phones lay a tattered paperback copy of Watership Down, a Browning Russ Kommer buck knife, and a half-smoked joint rolled with an exceptional homegrown strain Sawyer had uncovered in the basement of a derelict row-house the month previous. Being of a pre-apocalypse mint, the buds were dry as hell, but Sawyer was beyond pleased with her find. She hadn't indulged in a few years, but considering the current state of the world it felt like a good time to resume the habit. A bit of weed rendered all her messy memories into one big easy-to-ignore blur and left them running inconspicuously in the background.

 _Out here we is stoned, immaculate._

Jim Morrison had never been so right.

She lit the joint, lighter jittering minutely in her hand, and took a deep pull of sweet, comforting smoke. Her heart was stuck at its rabbit's pace. To distract herself, she followed the movements her nearest neighbor with wan interest.

In the narrow yard of the large house opposite, Shelly Niedermeyer was forking compost around the roots of a large clump of pampas grass. Compost that could have been put to use on some crop more paramount to survival than ornamental grass, thought Sawyer, exhaling with disdain. The hateful cow's back was turned, so Sawyer was certain that, this time, at least, her screams had remained within the confines of her dream. Otherwise, Shelly would have been dripping her phony concern all over Sawyer while internally gloating gleefully.

Sawyer had just taken a second hit when a sharp squeal of rolling metal echoed up the street. Her head shot up and she froze with the joint pinched between her fingers. Shelly Niedermeyer looked up from her clump of pampas grass with dull bovine curiosity.

There were strangers inside the gates.

"Shit," Sawyer murmured again, eyes going wide. She groped in the grass for the Browning Russ Kommer.

A band of perhaps fifteen rough looking men and women with sharp eyes and loaded guns were staring her way. At the forefront of the group stood a tall man with a grizzled beard. He was lean and haggard and held an infant in one hand and a pistol in the other. Sweeping the empty streets with piercing eyes, he zeroed in on Sawyer and Shelly before seeming to dismiss them as inconsequential.

What the hell was going on?

Sawyer watched anxiously and wished she hadn't taken that second hit.

Leading the newcomers up the street was Aaron, which did much to settle Sawyer's nerves. Out of everyone she had met in Alexandria, Aaron was the only one who Sawyer trusted wholeheartedly. Levelheaded and kind, Aaron had been the one to find her when she had been nearing her breaking point out on her own. He had brought her back with him and offered her safety and a home. If Aaron thought this group was worthy of a chance Sawyer would trust his judgment.

Aaron was in earnest conversation with the tall bearded man. Nicholas trailed behind in his usual apprehensive manner. A third man, broad-shouldered and seeming to consist of leather and hair held together by a thick layer of grime, swung a possum by its tail. He shouldered a crossbow and was squinting with obvious dislike while Nicholas tried to explain what was expected of them if they were to come any farther.

"If you're going to stay," Nicholas began, having apparently found his balls after a moment of tense silence, "You'll have to turn over all of your weapons."

 _Well good for him, the idiot,_ Sawyer herself would have demanded that they disarm before being allowed through the gates, but coming from Nicholas even this late-blooming display of common sense was a miracle. Fifteen armed strangers against one armed moron. It was truly a wonder Alexandria was still standing.

Predictably, Nicholas' suggestion was met with less than enthusiasm from the group.

The grizzly-bearded man, obviously their leader, tipped his head almost quizzically. There was no question in his eyes, however; only a coldly calculating glint. Sawyer could just make out his words in the distance.

"If we were going to use them," the cold-eyed man said, speaking of their many guns, "we would have started by now."

 _Salient point_ , thought Sawyer, watching the exchange and exhaling the smoke she had been holding for too long. Maybe it was just the weed talking, but she was beginning to feel too exposed. She tucked the end of the extinguished roach into her book as a marker and snatched up her towel from the grass.

The man holding the crossbow turned sharply at her sudden motion. His squinting eyes raked over her half-bare body with a thoroughness that left her feeling more naked than she actually was. She saw what she thought was a fleeting look of disapproval cross his hard features. He set his jaw in a hard _L_ and lowered his head slightly, letting his grimy hair fall across his forehead and into his eyes.

A flush of shame elicited by his glance caught Sawyer by surprise. What must she look like to someone coming from the outside, blithely sunning herself while walkers roamed and people died? The answer was a damned fool, just as the rest of the Alexandrians had seemed to her when she had first arrived at their gates, starving and half feral, only a bare month before.

Tucking her towel around her bare midriff, leaving only her long, tanned legs on display, Sawyer jumped up from the lounge. She couldn't handle this, not now with the throes of her nightmare still rattling around inside her head and the beginnings of a good high cruising along. Clutching the towel and the Browning, she left Shelly Niedermeyer open-mouthed on the street and fled behind the tall stockade privacy fence enclosing the backyard belonging to her very own colonial McMansion.

Was it her imagination or did those slitted, disapproving eyes follow her every step? A stir of anger tinged her shame.

Her backyard was little more than a grass-thatched postage stamp behind the house. It sported all the usual perks of upper middle class living: A stone patio with lounge and grill, a raised deck, and (long stagnant now) a kidney-shaped in-ground pool. Instead of the suburban smell of chlorine, burgers, and fresh cut grass, a strong gaseous odor of rotting vegetation permeated the air around the pool. Sawyer breathed deeply and hid behind the privacy fence with her face pressed to a gap in the slats.

The world was humming along good now that the joint was really kicking in. The marshy fumes didn't bother Sawyer at all. In fact, she found the smell comforting; a slice of dark reality in the midst of this posh oasis, like a gritty reminder not to become too comfortable in what was nothing more than a mirage waiting to be dispelled. Sawyer wasn't fool enough to think those walls would hold forever.

Through the fence she saw Crossbow and Beard (as she had christened them in her mind) still speaking with Aaron. She noted with droll amusement that none of the newcomers had surrendered their weapons. Nicholas sulked on the sidelines, obviously nettled that no one had seen fit to recognize his authority.

"So you saw them, too," said a man's voice suddenly behind her.

Sawyer started, dazed enough from the effect of the joint that she hadn't been aware anyone else was in her yard.

"Pete," she sighed wearily, acknowledging the owner of the voice without turning.

Pete Anderson was the very last person she wanted to see right now. Or ever, really.

Pete was Alexandria's resident surgeon. He lived with his wife, Jessie, and their two sons, Sam and Ron, in the house behind Sawyer's. Their backyards shared a gated fence, which was proving inconvenient. Sawyer would have been happier had they not shared so much as the same zip code.

"I heard the main gate open," he said by way of explanation for his presence. He crossed the knee-high grass to join Sawyer where she eavesdropped at the fence. His sandy blonde hair was impeccably parted, and, despite the August sunshine, he wore a sweater vest and neatly pressed khakis.

Sidling up to her with a familiarity that made Sawyer faintly nauseous, Pete placed his hand possessively on her bare upper arm. Sawyer shied away with a grimace, though she was careful to make it look as though straightening her slipping towel was her only reason for pulling away.

Feeling her dismissal, Pete narrowed his eyes and let his hand fall to his side.

"You should go to meet them," she suggested, hoping to get Pete to leave. "They have children. Some of them might need medical attention."

Pete frowned at the poorly concealed eagerness in her voice. "You don't sound pleased to see me."

Sawyer forced a smile. "Not at all," she said, purposely leaving her reply ambiguous. "But hush if you're going to stay. I want to hear what they're saying."

"You've been avoiding me," Pete continued, ignoring her request for silence.

Sawyer turned, meeting his iced blue eyes. The simmering anger there was so apparent to her now that she wondered how she could have been so stupid to have missed it when they first met. "Not at all," she lied. "You know we've been busy with supply runs. Aiden says we have a new cache of warehouses to clear down on the south end of town. He thinks there's a good supply of panels for the solar grid that we could use."

Sawyer could tell Pete was unconvinced. He was a man who liked things written out in clear black and white. Easier to maintain that tight, rigorous control of a surgeon, even outside of the operating room. Alexandria was lucky to have him, but Sawyer wasn't glad at all to have him in her backyard, especially while she was virtually alone and wearing next to nothing.

 _Not that he hasn't already seen every naked inch of me,_ she thought darkly with a frown.

Mistakes, everywhere she turned. Alexandria was slowly becoming a minefield, and Sawyer had only herself to blame for placing the mines. For the past month, Aaron -patient, wonderful Aaron- had tried and failed to help her find her place in their society. But by now, even Aaron had most likely given her up as a lost cause. Sawyer had always possessed the most unbelievable knack for getting in her own way.

Case in point, Pete.

"When can I see you again?" Pete demanded, breaking in on her thoughts. He was closer now. His mouth hovered near her ear. She fought a shudder of revulsion as his breath mingled with her sweat-damp hair.

"Don't," she cautioned, stepping back.

He stepped toward her, and this time his hand on her arm was not gentle.

"I asked you a question. You see, I don't think you're being straight with me. What's got you rattled? Is it Jessie?"

"Of course it's Jessie!" she hissed. "You didn't tell me you had a _wife_ , so don't you dare accuse _me_ of not playing straight! You know damn well I- "

Pete's fist smashing into her mouth cut her words short. Her head snapped back with a gasp.

Then, just as quickly as his fist had appeared, his arms wrapped around her, comforting her as though he were rocking a child. "I didn't want to do that. Shh, I'm sorry, there. But you'll learn, you'll learn..."

For a moment, Sawyer was too shocked to do more than allow him to hold her. Then her hand tightened around the Browning under her towel and brought her to her senses. Her lower lip pulsed angrily against her teeth and she felt a trickle of blood run down her chin.

"You get the fuck away from me," she breathed ominously, tasting her blood. Between them, beneath the towel, she raised the knife. Pete froze as he felt the point of the Browning press inconspicuously against his chest. "Right now."

Pete released Sawyer and raised his hands in surrender, but she could feel the mockery in his gesture. He wasn't sorry, and he wasn't scared.

What he was was angry. Very, very angry.

"Stay back." She brought the knife into plain view, holding her arm extended. Slowly she backed toward the open front gate. Carefully she smeared the blood on her chin over her lips, hoping it would pass for lipstick from a distance.

Pete stared after her with glittering malice in his eyes, but stayed back. For now.

Sawyer thrust the knife back under the towel and turned just in time to catch herself from stumbling over the lounge chair. Shelly Niedermeyer was watching, no doubt filing away new details to use to support her inflammatory gossip concerning Sawyer's many oddities. Thankfully, it would have been impossible for Shelly to have seen Pete from that angle; then she would really have had some ammunition capable of making Sawyer's life a living hell. As it was, stories of Sawyer stumbling around stoned all over the place were sure to circulate.

Sawyer's head was spinning and her heart hammered. Out of habit she pulled the remaining roach from her book and lit it, suddenly desperate for an annihilating high. _Fucking Shelly_ , she thought, shaking still. _Fucking Pete._

The affair with Pete was her own goddamn fault. She had made the mistake of sleeping with him once, nearly a month ago when she first arrived in Alexandria. Deanna's goddamn welcoming party for Sawyer and several other new 'recruits,' as they called the newcomers. Liquor had flowed unfettered, and Sawyer, fresh from the outside, hadn't touched a drop in close to a year. The scotch had gone straight to her head and Pete had closed in. There hadn't been a ring for her to see until it materialized the next morning. Lesson learned, but the harm had already been done.

Sawyer had been growing worried; the way Pete hounded her after she found out he was married showed he had already become obsessed. She had seen his need for control and gratification to his ego. But he had never shown any signs of his taste for violence before now. This was a whole new problem.

What a mess. What a huge goddamn mess.

She a prickle ran along the back of her neck as she sensed a second pair of eyes watching her. She glanced down the street.

Crossbow was staring at her again with disconcerting intensity. Sawyer glared back.

With wanton exaggeration, she raised the now-stubby joint to her blood-slicked lips and watched as the man's face darkened. She felt an unexpected rush of heated anger swarm into her cheeks. Who did this possum-toting asshole think he was to judge her?

Her burst of anger was accompanied by the urge to flip him off, but she still gripped the Browning in the hand hidden beneath the towel. Without breaking eye contact she let smoke build inside her mouth, pooling around her tongue. When she judged the cloud thick enough, she opened her mouth, centered her tongue, and exhaled a single perfect smoke ring. She blew the ring pointedly in Crossbow's direction, letting her eyes say the rest.

Then, without waiting for his reaction, Sawyer turned and sauntered coolly up the porch steps, whipping off her towel and giving her ass an extra bit of sass as she did.

What with her fat lip and bruised ego, it was as good a telling-off as she could muster just this moment.

"Welcome to Alexandria," she called boldly over her bronzed shoulder before the door slammed.

Once inside, she sunk shaking against the wall, head buried in her arms.

Today could just go to hell.


	2. Chapter 2

AN: I realize Sawyer comes off a bit weak in the beginning, but I hope you'll give her a chance; you're meeting her at a particularly bad time in her life and she's not at her best. I've got more exciting things coming within a few chapters, I promise! I should have faster updates later, I have certain parts written ahead. Please let me know what you think so far! I can't tell you how much reviews mean. Thanks for reading!

Sometimes I find myself long regretting some foolish thing, some simple thing I've done

But I'm just a soul whose intentions are good,

Oh Lord, please don't let me be misunderstood

-The Animals, Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood

* * *

When Sawyer looked through her back window into the yard Pete was gone.

She padded barefoot through the great empty house, checking and locking all the windows and doors. The humid air inside simmered without so much as the stir of a breeze from an open window; although air conditioning was available at her fingertips, Sawyer couldn't bring herself to waste the electricity and left it off.

It had been a month to the day since Sawyer had made the decision to follow Aaron through the gates of Alexandria. She hardly knew what she had been expecting, but it hadn't been this–house-proud cowards blessed with fool's luck enough to find themselves in possession of an envious fortress heaped with canned goods and firearms–fools who had never known the hell of life outside their walls. As far as Sawyer could tell, aside from the original brilliance of constructing their walls, the Alexandrians hardly seemed to have earned anything they had.

Her Alexandria welcome packet had included a three bedroom, two and a half bath colonial with a two car garage and the empty in-ground pool at the center of her spacious fenced-in backyard. It was unlike any place Sawyer had ever lived before, and she had called many places home over her checkered and colorful lifetime of thirty-two years. She took an instant dislike to the house's echoing cleanliness, its order and blandness. She felt as though she were a memory sealed inside a time capsule.

All she had wanted that first night in Alexandria was the touch of another person. She would rather have taken _any_ one home to avoid facing the emptiness of this frightfully huge house alone. Pete was mostly to blame–he had, after all, removed his wedding ring–but if weakness was a sin, Sawyer was guilty of that much at least.

Pete, with his strange intensity... Wasn't that part of the reason she had gone with him in the first place? There was a darkness in him that Sawyer, in her initial state of disconnect and disorientation, had mistaken for authenticity in the otherwise whitewashed reality of Alexandria, whose inhabitants hunkered safely behind their walls dusting houseplants and swapping casserole recipes.

At Deanna's party Pete had been unimpeachably polite. As they talked, Sawyer found him pleasantly attentive. He had drawn her out of her quietude, bringing her drinks and making small talk until she was comfortable. She remembered they discussed art, of all things. Before deciding to become a doctor it turned out he had gone to art school. Sawyer had been drunk enough by that time to be impressed. Artists appealed to her eccentric bohemian nature.

A few more drinks and she was a bit foggy on the rest, although Shelly Neidermeyer had been kind enough to repeat enough of what had happened for Sawyer to piece together that she had gone on a heated drunken tear, calling out Deanna and all of Alexandria for their negligence and complacency. It seemed to her as though they had forgotten what lay on the other side of their precious walls; they had swept all the unpleasantness out of sight and were determined not to think of it. She supposed she had still been reeling from her sudden change in circumstance. They were probably glad when Pete offered to escort her home.

The next thing Sawyer knew it was morning and Pete was dressing in the vast master bath off of her bedroom. She rose from the bed and watched without comment from the doorway as he slid a gold band onto his left ring finger. She never did find out what excuse he had given his wife to explain his absence that night.

Sawyer hadn't slept with him since, and went out of her way to avoid him. As far as she was concerned, that night had never happened.

Not so for Pete, apparently.

Gingerly, she touched the corner of her lip. Her fingers came back clean, but she knew she had really made a mess out of things this time.

She went into the master bathroom, where Pete had stood smiling as he'd slipped on his wedding ring. Flipping the switch for the light above the ornate vanity mirror, Sawyer steeled herself for the stab of anguish that was to come.

She was not disappointed. As always, the sight of her unwelcome reflection brought a bleak wave of sorrow nearly too great to be borne.

A woman with an angular, too thin face peered out from a cloud of lustrous honeyed hair. She was cold and dead-eyed, her blood-crusted lips compressed in a tight line. The sudden ache she felt for her sister was indescribable. Angrily, she whispered to the ghost within her reflection. " _Why aren't you here?"_

Perhaps she was going crazy.

But the ghost in the mirror had no answer to impart, so Sawyer supposed she must not be crazy just yet. If Jamie started answering she would worry then.

Physically, everything from the sisters' thick honey colored hair to their generous smiles were as identical as it was possible for twins to be. Their personalities, however, had been polar opposites. Jamie had been the serious twin; the gentle one. Sawyer had been the hellcat, always in trouble and laughing it off, jumping from one troubled whirlwind to another. Now, Sawyer reflected darkly, their greatest difference was that Jamie was dead and she, Sawyer, was here.

She took out a cotton ball and dabbed antiseptic onto her lip, then squared her shoulders to give the remainder of her appearance a brutal appraisal.

Over a year of near-starvation conditions and constant running had ravaged most of her curves. She would have been considered willowy before the breakout, but now she was almost gaunt. She frowned at the meager mounds her breasts formed within the twin triangles of her bikini. Not that she had ever been particularly gifted in the breast department, but she was going to wind up concave if she lost any more weight. She hadn't lived in Alexandria long enough to flesh out much, and thanks to that bastard Pete it suddenly looked like she might not be staying for very much longer. Bitterness settled over her face, making her suddenly appear older than her thirty-two years.

Her best feature was her laughing smile. It was in sad shape today, however; the right side of her mouth had swollen into a lopsided pucker. She dabbed more antiseptic against her mouth, swiping at the ruby blood that had passed for lipstick earlier but had now dried to an unattractive flaking maroon crust. She noticed a greenish bruise forming just above her chin and gave her face up as a lost cause.

Pivoting in the mirror, she followed the long _J_ -line curve of her back downward. At least she had kept her ass, her second best feature after her smile. She never seemed to have many smiles on hand these days anyway.

Sawyer grimaced, thinking back to her display on the porch. Classic Sawyer, already getting off on the wrong foot with this incoming group of survivors. She knew she had a spiteful temper, and, thanks to her colorful upbringing, social norms were just something she tended to either waltz around or stomp all over. Well, she had stomped all over the niceties of polite introduction, now, hadn't she? _Welcome to Alexandria!_ she had shouted as she'd sauntered up the stairs. Sawyer cringed inwardly, feeling like an asshole.

She wondered what Crossbow had made of her rudeness. God, she had practically shook her ass at him. She flushed at the memory of his hard eyes. Now that her ire had cooled she regretted her taunt. He had done nothing to deserve it, not really.

Well, there was nothing to do for it now, and besides, after this new development with Pete, there was now a chance she wouldn't be around long enough for it to matter anyhow.

With a sigh, Sawyer shut off the light and went to her room to change into a pair of worn jeans and a plain black tank. She left her hair hanging in thick waves and didn't bother to put on a bra. Barefoot, she padded into the kitchen to find something to eat, threading her way through a minefield of gallon paint cans. The pristine blandness of the house grated on her; she had meant to splash some color around on the walls, but somehow her heart just hadn't been in it. She had, however, made sure to at least paint the porch steps and railing a violently fluorescent shade of magenta. She was aware how petty she was being, but it was satisfying to think how Shelly Neidermeyer must enjoy the lurid sight every morning as she took her coffee. Shelly could shove that little bit of curb appeal right up her pastel-loving, khaki-wearing, gossiping keister.

There wasn't much food in the kitchen. She would have to go down to the pantry, or perhaps make a solo run for supplies. It occurred to her that she might want to search for a working vehicle in case she had to leave; Deanna wasn't likely to give her one if it came to that, and Sawyer was no thief. It was best to be prepared.

She scarfed down her last can of Campbell's minestrone, heating it first in the microwave, then laced on a pair of sensible boots. Pantry first, supply run second. She walked out the front door, checking the street first for any sign Pete might be lurking nearby. She knew she would have to face him eventually, but right now she wasn't in the mood for a confrontation. Avoidance was more her style; Sawyer was nothing if not a class A runner. Had been her whole life.

And that, in a nutshell, was why Sawyer was still alive and Jamie was not.

* * *

The little red light on the camera was blinking, but Daryl couldn't seem to make himself sit down. It was too much like being inside an interrogation room. There was even a wall-length mirror hanging above the sideboard. His palms were starting to sweat, which was ridiculous because this place has air conditioning.

Air-conditioning. The only time in Daryl's life he had ever had air-conditioning, aside from those shitty window-box units that couldn't cool one tiny-ass bedroom in a single-wide, was when he had been at school or in a store. Daryl wondered what Merle would have said if he'd seen how these people lived. You could bet it would have been colorful.

"Mr. Dixon, please sit down." Deanna Munroe invited, smiling a confident politician's smile.

Mr. Dixon. Daryl scoffed. In his experience, the only people who called him Mr. Dixon were court appointed attorneys. It added to his feeling of being on trial.

"Nah, I'm good," he said, pacing like a caged wildcat with the possum.

Deanna watched him pace. "Mr. Dixon, do you even want to be here?"

Daryl thought for a moment. Truth was, he didn't. But most of the others did, and Daryl wanted to be with them, so this was the closest he came to wanting to be to anywhere.

"The boy and the baby, they deserve a roof over their heads," he replied honestly, yet evading a direct answer.

Deanna considered him silently, her thin skin cracking at the corners of her eyes and her dry mouth poised in that smile. Daryl knew the look; she was waiting for him to become discomfited by her direct gaze and fill the silence. A basic interrogation technique. Well, two could play at that. He thunked the possum nonchalantly down on the table, just to see what she would make of it lying there among her pointless knick-knacks and baubles.

The goddamn possum. He hadn't known what to do with it after they'd turned over their guns (Daryl still had the Stryker crossbow strapped to his back; he'd be damned if he would part with it) and so he was still carrying it around like a goddamn Gucci handbag. There had been a moment when he was being led to his interview where he had considered simply driving its slowly stiffening body like a football right at that spineless excuse for a guard, Nicholas, but he had checked the impulse, reminding himself, _you're doing this for Judith, for Carl_.

If Deanna was perturbed by the possum carcass on her table she made no show of it. She continued as if nothing were amiss.

"Not everyone makes the transition easily." Deanna pursed her lips, looking a tad sour, which gave Daryl the impression she was thinking of someone specific. He wondered if that someone was still here, and what happened to those who didn't work out the way Deanna wanted. "How many you taken in?" he asked, curious.

"Plenty, although never a group so large as your own. How you've all kept together is simply amazing. You must be very close."

Daryl shrugged. It wasn't any of her business. "The others you've taken in, they all still here?"

"Most have stayed. We have much to offer; electricity, food, safety–"

"And the ones who ain't here anymore?" Daryl interrupted. He didn't need the sales pitch. He wanted to know how tenuous was the ground on which they stood.

Deanna's amused look said she knew she was being cornered. "Alexandria is a good place. There are no hidden dangers, nothing that any of you are likely to find unappealing. Those who have left were escorted out the front gate on my own command because I deemed them a danger to our community. It was not a decision I made lightly. A minor offense is not enough to get anyone thrown out of Alexandria, but we do expect compliance and hard work from all of our residents."  
"Exile's as good as a death sentence," Daryl said baldly. "If they were such bad people that they deserved that, why didn't Aaron didn't suss that out before he brought them in?"

Deanna's eyes darkened. "That was early on. Aaron is much more careful now. We all are. We learn as we go along. We all make mistakes."

They _hadn't_ learned, though. Deanna seemed proud of Alexandria's security, but Daryl saw all the gaping holes in their defenses. He wondered if any outsiders had pointed those weaknesses out to Deanna before. He considered doing so now, but, not wanting to rock the boat for Rick and the others, figured it was best to keep his mouth shut. Anything he said was likely to come out wrong, and Daryl was sure Deanna wouldn't take kindly to a critique coming from the likes of him. "We finished?" he asked gruffly. The little red light on the camera was back to taunting him.

Amusement was back in Deanna's eyes. She extended her hand. "Mr. Dixon, it's been a pleasure. Aaron will show you all to your new homes when all your interviews have concluded." Daryl glanced down at her clean wrinkled hand before taking it in his large dirty one. He dropped his grip quickly. Then Deanna did something that surprised Daryl. Smiling a politician's placating smile, she picked the stiff possum up by its scaly tail and held it out as politely as if she were handing Daryl his coat and hat to take his leave.

Daryl almost– _almost_ –huffed a laugh.

He reckoned that was him dismissed.


End file.
